On Thursday, February 26th, Scottish wedding singer Caitlin McNeill presented a question that shook the world: “Guys, please help me. Is this dress white and gold, or blue and black? Me and my friends can’t agree.” Who knew such a question could tear the world asunder?
The dress phenomenon began before a wedding, when the mother of the bride sent the now-infamous picture of the dress to her daughter. When her daughter, the bride, showed the dress to her fiancé, they disagreed on the color—the drama rapidly escalated and others began taking notice of the controversial dress. Then Caitlin McNeill, the singer in a band that was set to play at the wedding, also took notice and posted said question on Tumblr—creating the debate that shook the Internet.
Soon enough, BuzzFeed News posted the photo of the dress, and created a poll asking the public to “settle this. Is the dress blue and black or white and gold?” Suddenly, the dress went viral and received approximately 38.5 million views within a matter of days. According to the poll on BuzzFeed, 68% of the participants say that the dress is white and gold, and the other 32% state that the dress is blue and black. Even celebrities chimed in, such as Taylor Swift, who saw the dress as “obviously blue and black,” and others such as Kim Kardashian, who reported that she saw white and gold. On the other hand, mysterious colors have been seen, as proven through Congressman Eric Swalwell’s tweet that “[the dress is] clearly blue and green.”
Ultimately, Michele Bastock, design director at Roman Originals, the dress’s brand, told The Washington Post, “I can officially say that this dress is royal blue with black lace trimming.” But if the dress is blue and black, why are people seeing other colors? Was this all just a prank? After all, as the Internet is pervaded by trolls, can anyone be sure of anything posted on the Internet?
Incredible theorists proposed a myriad of reasoning, from how the colors of the dress reflected one’s emotions to sorcery and the partaking of the Illuminati. Ridge High School students have also created their own theories, such as Anusha Siddarama ’17, who believes that the controversy is due to the “lighting reflecting off of the material accumulated with the difference in the intensity of lighting, thus changing the color.”
Eventually, others began presenting more reliable, scientific theories, such as Daniel Hardiman-McCartney, clinical adviser to Britain’s College of Optometrists, who informed Smithsonian Tween Tribune that the “exceptional bar-code style of the dress, combined with the strongly yellow-toned backlighting in the one photo, provides the brain a rare chance. The brain can ‘choose’ which of the dress’ two primary colors should be seen in detail.” Thus, certain people that perceive the background as brightly illuminated “choose” that the dress is a darker shade of blue and black. However, people who perceive the dress in poorer lighting conclude that the dress is a shade of white and gold.
And so, despite the overwhelmingly large percentage of poll participants that saw the dress as white and gold, the dress has been confirmed as blue and black. At least, as Shaheer Rizwan ’17 states, “it’s a good thing stoplights aren’t the colors of the dress!”